After several rounds of this back-and-forth, the Ant Nest's forces began to run out of steam. At the same time, the Insect Nest's Worker Ants had exhausted their reserves of Formic Acid Solution.
Rowan, who had been watching the battle from the sidelines for a long time, finally moved to the front lines. He was several times larger than the Soldier Ants. With the insects working together, he charged across the battlefield like a bulldozer, smashing through everything in his path.
It wasn't that he was a coward. All right, fine, he had been a little cowardly at first.
With a body like his, it was easy to become the focus of enemy attacks.
As his body grew larger, his strength and constitution had improved considerably. But his body structure also made him much less capable of dealing with small targets. His back, in particular, was a blind spot in his defenses.
If too many Worker Ants from the Ant Nest surrounded him, he wouldn't be able to defend himself. And if those guys climbed onto his back, he wouldn't have any good way to deal with them.
His entire body was basically covered in hard chitin armor, which those small combat units couldn't break through. The only exception was his pair of bulbous eyes, which lacked the necessary protection. The Worker Ants' jaws could easily damage them.
Back when the Insect Nest's squad had surrounded the Cliff Spider, the Worker Ants had crawled straight into its body through its wounds. The Worker Ants from the Ant Nest, which were based on the Insect Nest's basic Worker Ant template, could probably pull off the same trick.
He had no desire to find out what it felt like to suffer the same fate as that spider.
Besides, his side already had the advantage in numbers. There was no need for the commander to charge into battle.
So, while the fighting was fierce in the early stages, he had watched from a distance, occasionally picking off a few returning Scout Worker Ants.
Now that the battle had calmed down, though, his blood was already pumping, and he could finally get up close and satisfy his urge to fight.
Several Worker Ants climbed onto his back armor to protect him from behind and stop any Worker Ants from the Ant Nest from sneaking up on him. Dozens more followed at his feet, guarding his Walking Legs and intercepting any enemies approaching from the sides...
Several Soldier Ants trailed behind him to defend his rear...
That meant Rowan only had to deal with the enemies in front of him.
His two big eyes were weak points in his defense, but the incredibly high refresh rate they gave him turned the enemy Worker Ants' and Soldier Ants' attempts to dodge into a joke.
His mandibles clamped precisely around a Worker Ant's thorax and abdomen. With a little pressure, its two halves fell away on either side of his closing jaws.
He thrust out one Walking Leg, darting it toward another Worker Ant.
The adhesive hairs on the small claw at the end of his Walking Leg spread open. He pulled the leg back, dragging the Worker Ant toward him.
His mandibles snapped shut and decapitated it. With a casual flick of his Walking Leg, he tossed the body still stuck to his claw aside.
Against opponents who were several levels below him, he could now dispatch them with a casual swipe.
Rowan worried that if things continued like this, his special talent, Rowan's Combat Technique, might lose its purpose from lack of practice.
Fortunately, another Soldier Ant from the Ant Nest came charging toward him. At least with its size, it was just about worthy of a demonstration of his talent.
So Rowan charged toward it in the opening stance of Rowan's Combat Technique.
Gradually, no new reinforcements emerged from the Ant Nest's entrance. The Ant Nest forces on the surface, cut off from further support, were soon divided and wiped out.
Rowan's antennae swayed from side to side, spreading pheromones that carried fresh orders. The Worker Ants guarding his Walking Legs scattered.
A moment later, a strike team of more than a dozen Soldier Ants rushed into the Ant Nest's entrance, followed closely by hundreds of Worker Ants assigned to support them.
Meanwhile, several underground reserve units received the Worker Ant messengers and accepted Rowan's new orders.
Several passages in the underground section of the Ant Nest were breached, revealing a number of Excavator Ants. They quickly widened the openings. Then large numbers of Worker Ants, led by Soldier Ants, charged into the passages.
In an instant, several Insect Nest units stormed into the Ant Nest from different directions.
The Ant Nest's fighting forces had already been depleted. The few remaining stragglers were incapable of mounting any effective resistance. To make matters worse, their Ant Queen had long since died, leaving them without anyone to command them. They fought on their own.
Soon, several Insect Nest units converged in the Ant Nest's Hatching Room. Under Rowan's command, some Soldier Ants each took a small group of Worker Ants and spread out to search the branching passages for any survivors.
Meanwhile, large numbers of Worker Ants poured into the Hatching Room to carry away the spoils. The food scraps there had been carefully ground up by the Worker Ants, making them easy to digest and excellent food.
The Insect Eggs, pupae, and larvae were also excellent sources of protein that could be recycled.
Even past midnight, the Worker Ant transport teams were still traveling back and forth through the underground passages, carrying the spoils from the battlefield. The two-way streams of ants formed two orderly lines.
As for Rowan, the highest-ranking commander in the battle, he felt that he had worked hard enough to earn a rest. He had already returned to his bedroom.
The postwar tally showed that nearly all of the Ant Nest's more than five thousand members had been wiped out. A few Scout Worker Ants had been outside the nest and had not returned because they were too far away. There weren't many survivors, so they weren't worth worrying about.
Thanks to the Insect Nest's excellent tactical leadership, it had lost only a few hundred Worker Ants and a little over twenty Soldier Ants. Rowan couldn't be bothered to tally the exact numbers. For one thing, he was the only one in the enormous Insect Nest who could count. As the Insect Nest's highest-ranking leader, knowing roughly how many had died was enough. He didn't feel like counting every last one, and no insect would dare criticize him for it.
For another, the insects' corpses—some missing legs or other body parts, enemy and ally alike—had all been piled together. They could only be identified by the residual pheromones, making it impossible to tally the exact number.
The next morning, Rowan looked at the still-busy Insect Nest and revised the original battle plan.
The original goal of taking out one Ant Nest a day was put on hold. Rowan hadn't had a clear idea of what post-battle cleanup would involve. For starters, it would take several days for the Worker Ants to replenish their reserves of Formic Acid Solution.
Formic Acid Solution could blind large numbers of enemies and burn their forces, making it an excellent support weapon in war. But once the supply ran out, it took a long time to build it up again.
The spoils from wiping out an entire Ant Nest were substantial, and the Insect Nest would need some time to use them up. The nest was close to the lake, where the air was very humid and food didn't keep well. Taking out four Ant Nests in quick succession would leave them with a huge stockpile of food. If they couldn't use it up in time, a great deal of it would probably spoil.
The insects in the Insect Nest were all creations of the Mother Nest, and Rowan had a certain intimate relationship with the Mother Nest that couldn't be spoken of openly. The way the insects treated Rowan's pheromone orders as if they were sacred decrees was proof enough of how close they were.
So none of the insects would dare object to Rowan's decisions.
And so, the Insect Nest forces put their plans to attack the remaining Ant Nests on hold and began a short period of recovery.
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